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Rev. CHARLES BROOKS (1795-1872), 
Pastor of Third Parish, Hingham. 

Painting by Frothingham, 1825, in possession of the Medford Historical Society. 






CHARLES BROOKS 



And His Work for Normal Schools 



BY 

JOHN ALBREE 



Read before the Medford Historical Society 
May fifth, igo6 



Press of J. C. Miller, Jr. 

Medford, Mass. 

1907 



LIBRARY of CONGRESS 

Two Conies Received 

apn iy 1907 

ipyrjeht Entry 

cuss CL * Xc -< No ' 



*epvneM 



L— 



COPY B. 



Copyright, 1907 
By JOHN ALBREE 



A WORD seems needed to justify printing a paper relating to 
a work which was completed seventy years ago. Charles 
Brooks himself showed a singular reticence about his labors, the 
reason for which has not clearly appeared.* Consequently, among 
his Medford friends and neighbors, Brooks' part in the educational 
revival was not understood, and with the lapse of time such ideas 
as did exist, became vague. To set forth the facts therefore this 
paper was prepared and read before a company of Medford people, 
some of whom as children had known Mr. Brooks, and on their 
request it is now submitted to a wider circle. 

JOHN ALBREE. 
Swampscott, Massachusetts, 
January i, 1907. 



* Brooks' Medford, p. 285. 



REPRINTED FROM THE "HISTORICAL REGISTER," 
VOL. X. No. 1, JANUARY. 1907. PUBLISHED BY 
THE MEDFORD HISTORICAL SOCIETY 



CHARLES BROOKS and his 

Work for Normal Schools 



By way of prelude let me ask if the traditions will be violated 
if a text is chosen, especially if it is agreed that the text will not 
again be referred to ? This is necessary by reason of the comments 
that have been made by some on learning that a paper was in prepa- 
ration on " Charles Brooks and His Work for Normal Schools." 
These comments, more or less diplomatic and guarded, have been to 
the effect that the name of Horace Mann ought to appear in the title. 

The text is " One star differeth from another star in glory." 

ON a summer afternoon, how many years ago is not 
material, a baby was a member of a little party 
that called at the home of the Brooks family in Medford, 
a home that by reason of its furnishings and surround- 
ings was entitled to be called the Brooks Mansion. 
Nothing could have been further from the minds of that 
household than that in the future that baby, when grown 
to manhood, was to stand before a Medford audience 
of Medford people and submit for consideration a 
paper on their " Brother Charles," for that was the way 
he was always addressed, in the delightfully formal 
manner characteristic of their home life. Furthermore, 
that in such a paper it would be assumed at the out- 
set that neither Charles Brooks nor his work would 
then be known in Medford, their Medford, and that the 
time would then have arrived when they, both brothers 
and sisters, would well nigh have passed from the memory 
of living men. 

At times it seems to have come over Charles Brooks 
that perhaps his three years of hard, though ultimately 
successful work might not have secured a firm place in 



G CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS 

history. In 1845, we ^ n d that in a letter giving an 
account of his labors he tried to forecast the future. 
He indulged in a little fancy and said, "Some educa- 
tional antiquary, in his pardonable weakness, may show 
my lectures fifty years hence as they sometimes show 
old cannon."* And tonight the thought of sixty years 
ago becomes a fact. While perhaps the title of " educa- 
tional antiquary " hardly applies to your essayist, it will 
be assumed and the results of the delving recounted. 
Fortunately a valuable clew to the situation was found, 
and through the thoughtfulness of Mrs. Sarah Warner 
Brooks important, original material, a scrap-book, of 
Brooks' was found. Without this book, so carefully 
prepared, this paper must have been based on evidence 
at second hand and of doubtful authenticity. As it is, 
we are able to hear Charles Brooks' own words, and 
to examine cotemporary evidence in support of his 
statements. 

When the educational revival had been in progress 
for twenty-five years, and teachers and educators had 
appreciated the magnificence of the undertaking, it 
seemed to them to be well to hold a meeting at which 
the historical features might be treated. It was to this 
meeting that Charles Brooks was invited. The record 
of the meeting is most valuable, for here we find at first 
hand the stories of those concerned, and the particular 
work of each is described. 

The invitation Brooks received was from the com- 
mittee, that he attend "The Quarter Centennial Normal 
School Celebration at Framingham, July 1, 1864." The 
secretary, George N. Bigelow, added a few lines to the 
printed form which are suggestive. 

" It seems best that we should hear from your own lips some- 
thing of the work that you did in the establishing of Normal 
Schools. ... I am sorry that I was so ignorant of your great 
labors in this work of Normal Schools. But then, when you were 
so gloriously engaged, I was just entering my teens, and what 
should a mere boy be expected to know of what you have so long 
kept in silence for the sake of your children ? " 

•Old Colony Memorial Newspaper, Plymouth. October 4, 1845. 



CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 7 

Brooks accepted the invitation and made an address 
in which he reviewed his work.* This review will be 
considered later in its course, but it is referred to at this 
time because it shows that, in using the scrap-book in 
the compilation of this paper, we are doing what Brooks 
expected would be done at some time. Picture to your- 
selves, therefore, this slightly built, elderly man, with a 
winning smile and charming manner, standing before 
that audience over twoscore of years ago and beginning 
his address with these words, for they show how he felt, 
and they corroborate a statement in the Bigelow letter 
about his keeping silence: — 

"Mr. President: I am called to a position which I have tried 
to avoid. For more than a quarter of a century I have kept a pro- 
found silence concerning my connection with the introduction of 
the present system of State Normal Schools in New England, and 
should have kept silence to the end, had not this noble, patriotic, 
and Christian celebration induced some friends to tempt me to 
break that silence, averring it injustice to withhold the facts. 

" It happens that I alone possess all the historical documents, 
and I have used them in writing a history of one hundred and 
sixty-eight pages concerning the public movements in 1835 to 1S3S, 
not for publication, but as a legacy to my children. I have care- 
fully preserved in one large quarto volume all the manuscript, doc- 
umentary evidence, and in a folio, all the printed evidence of the 
facts I have stated, carefully noting dates and places. 

"Now can you imagine anything more ridiculous and contra- 
dictory than for a living man to stand up here and read his post- 
humous histories? Has God opened a seam in the dark cloud of 
the grave that he may send one ray of light to increase the full- 
orbed joy of this sacred occasion? " 

You note that he mentions three books he prepared, 
but of them only one, the last mentioned, has come to 
light. The manuscript history and the volume of man- 
uscript documentary evidence have eluded discovery, 
but the folio of the printed evidence, with dates and 
places carefully noted, is before you. 

He began the book as a " Common place Book," using 

*History of Missionary Agency of the State Normal Schools of Prussia in Massachusetts in 
1835-6-7 and 8. Read at the Quarter Centennial Normal School Celebration in Framingham, Mas- 
sachusetts, July 1, 1864, by Rev. Charles Brooks, Medford. Boston Evening Transcript, July 
13, 1864. Also, printed by request: not published. Boston, John Wilson & Son, 1864. 



8 CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 

it for sundry scraps and clippings. Later, some of these 
earlier scraps were covered with others of later date. In 
addition, there is the usual miscellaneous assortment of 
scraps having no connection with each other. What- 
ever he wrote that had appeared in the papers he has 
preserved, also, any mention of him was duly clipped 
and inserted. 

There are some family scraps, tax bills, etc. Here is 
a bill rendered his great great grandfather,Cochran Reeve, 
in 1738, for expenses on account of a slave. The items 
are specified as freight, nursing, and a coffin. The jail- 
ors's bill had not been received, so that could not be 
included. But for our present purpose we find many 
clippings which will be referred to from time to time. 

It is a strange sensation to study, not to glance has- 
tily, but to study a scrap-book, especially such a personal 
one as this. In our own experience we find ourselves 
at times perplexed as to why we preserved some clip- 
ping. It was probably Brooks' experience as well. And 
yet, after reading what he said about the " educational 
antiquary," one is struck with these lines, pasted just be- 
low his printed signature on a circular regarding the 
Clergyman's Aid Society. It seems as if he may have 
again been looking into the future. 

CONSOLING. 
You '11 be forgotten as old debts 

By persons who are used to borrow ; 
Forgotten as the sun that sets 

When shines a new one on the morrow. 
Forgotten, like the luscious peach 

That blessed the school boy last September ; 
Forgotten, like a maiden speech 

Which all men praise, but none remember. 

But later he wrote these lines, when he was in a rem- 
iniscent mood, and dated them 1865. 

And though some hopes I cherished once 
Died most untimely in their birth, 

Yet I have been beloved and blest 
Beyond the measure of my worth. 




CHARLES BROOKS (1795-1872), 
At Eleven Years, 1866. 

Silhouette by King, a <leserveilly Famous silhonet t ist nf the period 



CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 9 

The question arose as to how fully these clippings 
represented the newspaper accounts of Brooks' work, 
and so it seemed well to examine a file of a cotemporary 
newspaper. The Hingham paper was selected, as that 
was the paper of his town, and the result showed thai- 
Brooks clipped and preserved in the scrap-book practi- 
cally all the references to himself that appeared in the 
paper. Mr. Brooks relied on the press for much help 
during his active work, but the methods of that day 
were much different from those of ours. There was 
not the appeal to the interest of all classes and condi- 
tions of men; the reading public seems to have been 
limited in numbers. But there have been many changes 
in thought and life during the seventy years that have 
elapsed since Charles Brooks was doing his grand work 
of bringing to the common people of Massachusetts a 
remedy for their great needs, and these changes must 
be considered before taking up directly what Brooks 
did. 

For instance, in the '30s an assemblage of the gentle 
sex was denominated a company of females. To this 
appellation some bright mind would venture a protest, 
but the custom was too firmly established to be set 
aside because some lone " female " objected. 

Again, suppose it were now printed on a notice that 
Harvard College sent to members of a committee, an- 
nouncing that a meeting would be held, " Gentlemen 
will please to select their own method of conveyance 
and charge the expense to the University." Such a 
note Mr. Brooks received. When one sees it he won- 
ders how many different methods there were for reach- 
ing Cambridge, which was the most used, and what was 
the expenditure of time and money. 

Or again, what is there in the statement, " As is the 
teacher, so is the school," that endangers the established 
order, or that is revolutionary in its character? Any 
man who would now hesitate to subscribe to that state- 
ment, " As is the teacher, so is the school," would find 



10 CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 

it difficult to get a hearing for his doubts. Yet it was 
to impress this truth on the thinking and acting minds 
of his day that Charles Brooks gave unsparingly of his 
time, his money, and his strength. 

If it were not for these changes in thought and life, 
it would suffice to read the Framingham address, which 
in 1864 Brooks delivered on his work, its methods, and 
results. It is written in his characteristic style, simple, 
frank, and attractive, but unless one can get at the gen- 
eral thought of the time, the difficulties, the obstacles, 
the discouragements, and the triumphs, the address, if 
read without comment, would serve to arouse, but not 
to satisfy, inquiry. To meet this inquiry, to supply some 
comment, and to define Brooks' part in the great educa- 
tional revival, is the purpose of this paper. 

If we briefly summarize what Mr. Brooks' life had 
been prior to undertaking this work, we may be able 
to form a better conception of his personality, for this 
attractive personality was a predominating feature in 
his success. Few of those who knew him now remain, 
except such as knew him in his later years. It has 
been interesting to record the epithets these use in 
describing him. Genial is always the first, and then 
affable, pleasant, entertaining, sympathetic, industrious, 
are other words used to formulate the impression those 
who knew him have retained all these years. As the 
story of his work is told, we shall be able to see reasons 
for using words descriptive of deeper, stronger, and 
more abiding traits of character which will be discerned 
on a closer acquaintance. 

He was born in the ancient house still standing at 
the corner of High and Woburn streets, October 30, 
1795. He was fitted for Harvard under Dr. Luther 
Stearns, who came to Medford as a teacher, but who 
occasionally practised medicine. He became a member 
of the class of 18 16 at Harvard. 

The scrap-book contains a little relic of the student 
life of long ago. Napoleon Bonaparte was an object that 




Rev. CHARLES BROOKS (1795-1S72). 

HlNGHAM, lS21. 
Silhouette in colors, artist unknown. 



CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 11 

loomed large in the eyes of the world. He had just been 
sent to Saint Helena, and the question was whether he 
could escape. We find that two students expressed 
their beliefs in this record of a wager. There is no 
record whether the dinner was held. 

" Bet with C. Brooks that Napoleon Bonaparte will escape from 
the Island of St. Helena before the first of August, a.d., 1819 ; a 
good dinner at our class meeting. 

"November 12, 1815. Sam'l D. Bell."* 

This date in August, 1819, was chosen because that 
was the month in which Commencement exercises were 
then held. Brooks took good rank in his course, and 
on graduation continued his theological studies at Har- 
vard. In the month mentioned in the record of the 
wager he took his Master's degree and delivered the 
valedictory in Latin. This paper is still preserved. 

In November, 1820, he was invited to become pastor 
of the Third Church at Hingham at a salary of a thou- 
sand dollars, and here he remained until January, 1839, 
a period of eighteen years. Time permits only the 
mention of the activities of this enthusiastic young 
pastor, who did not confine his work alone to his church 
and his parish. And in these enterprises and undertak- 
ings he was the leader. The first year of his ministry 
he wrote a family prayer book, of which there were eigh- 
teen editions published. A Boston merchant bought 
two thousand copies, which in 1846 he had distributed 
widely through the publishers, the donor's name not 
being given. 

He established a Sunday-school — then a novel fea- 
ture — a parish reading society, was the founder and 
secretary of the Old Colony Peace Society. In fact, 
he appears to Have been the secretary in most of the 
societies with which he was connected. He was active 
in the Plymouth County Bible Society, and the year he 

*One of the last clippings Brooks inserted in the scrap book was an obituary notice of his 
college friend, Bell. Samuel Dana Bell (1797-1868) was a son of Governor Samuel Bell of New 
Hampshire. He studied law and practiced in Concord and Manchester. In 1859 he was appointed 
Chief Justice of the Supreme Judicial Court. He resigned in 1865 and died at Manchester July, 1808. 



12 CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 

was abroad the work languished seriously. He advo- 
cated the establishment of the Hingham Institution for 
Savings, which still continues on its prosperous course. 
The account* of his introduction of anthracite coal 
into Hingham is preserved, telling how some of his 
friends were fearful for the safety of the Brooks house- 
hold with " those red hot stones " in the house at night. 
He agitated successfully for the establishment of the 
Hingham and Boston steamboat line, and generally he 
made his influence felt for the good of the community.! 

Meanwhile he married and had three children born, 
one of whom died in infancy. And it is not to be won- 
dered at, therefore, that under these varied achievements, 
requiring so much time, strength, and ardent endeavor, 
his health began to fail and rest was needed. So, in 
1833, he went to Europe, sailing November 1, 1833, in 
ship Erie from New York. 

There are suggestions in the scrap-book and in his 
writings of experiences he had, and of people^ he met on 
this journey, whose names are now household names. 
For instance, there is one clipping giving the story of 
his meeting Felicia Hemans, the author of the old Pil- 
grim hymn. His letters were carefully kept and then 
bound in one volume. He was untirinar in his sight 
seeing and painstaking in reporting all he saw. 

From this brief recital we can obtain some concep- 
tion of Charles Brooks, his personality, his character- 
istics, his capacity for work, and of the success which 
resulted. Now we must be allowed an inference that 
in all these activities, he could not but have appreciated 
the conditions of schools and of general education. Let 
us leave him for a while on his European trip, while we 
see what he must have seen, and what others certainly 
saw regarding the condition of schools. 

There are four who are competent authorities as to 
the condition of teachers and schools at this time. The 

*Hingham Journal, March 4, 1862. History of Hingham, Vol. I, Part II, p. 52. 

t Memoir of Rev. Charles Brooks, by Solomon Lincoln of Hingham. Proceedings Massachusetts 
Historical Society, June, 1880. 

J "I have letters to Miss Edgeworth, Mrs. Hemans, Miss Lucy Aiken, Miss Martineau, the 
Bishop of London, Lafayette, etc., etc." Letter of Brooks to his wife, October 31, 1833. 



CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 13 

first is James G. Carter, whose work will be later spoken 
of. In a paper,* published in 1824, he described the 
teachers of the primary summer schools as " possessed 
of very moderate attainments, for they were often very 
young, constantly changing their employment, and con- 
sequently with but little experience." He asks " if there 
is any other service in which young and often ignorant 
persons are employed, without some previous instruction 
in their appropriate duties." You wonder how such 
teachers were appointed, and Carter explains. He says, 
" No standard of attainments is fixed at which these 
female teachers must arrive before they assume the busi- 
ness of instruction, so that any one keeps school (which 
is a very different thing from teaching school), who 
wishes to do it and can persuade, by herself or her 
friends, a small district to employ her." 

Professor Francis Bowenf of Harvard, writing fifty 
years ago of the common school system of New Eng- 
land, said that at this time — the early 'thirties — "it had 
degenerated into routine, it was starved by parsimony. 
Any hovel would answer for a schoolhouse, any primer 
would do for a text-book, any farmer's apprentice was 
competent to keep school." 

George H. Martin, the present secretary of the Board 
of Education, and therefore a successor of Horace Mann, 
in his book which has become a standard, " The Evolu- 
tion of the Massachusetts Public School System," says,:j: 
" The majority of Massachusetts citizens were torpid, so 
far as school interests were concerned, or if aroused at 
all, awakened only to a spasmodic and momentary ex- 
citement over the building of a new chimney to a dis- 
trict schoolhouse, or the adding of a half-dollar a month 
to the wages of a school-mistress." 

And the fourth is Brooks himself. In his address 
before the American Institute-of Instruction, at Worces- 

*The Schools of Massachusetts in 1824, by James Gordon Carter. Old South Leaflets, No. 135. 

fMemoirof Edmund Dwight, by Francis Bowen. Barnard's Journal of Education, Vol. IV, p. 
14, September, 1857. 

JThe Evolution of the Massachusetts Public School System: a Historical Sketch, by George 
H. Martin, a.m., Supervisor of Public Schools, Boston. New York, D. Appleton & Co., 1904. 
P. 146. 



14 CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 

ter, August, 1837, he quoted from a petition to the Legis- 
lature the previous winter, and said, " The committee of 
the institute in their petition gave their evidence before 
the world in these words, ' A very large number of both 
sexes who teach the summer and winter schools are to 
a mournful degree wanting in all these qualifications, in 
short, they know not what to teach, nor how to teach, 
nor in what spirit to teach, nor what is the nature of 
those they undertake to lead, nor what they are them- 
selves to stand forward to lead them.' " 

I will not ask you to burden your minds with these 
quotations, for it is certain that some of the words will 
stay by you, such as, " young and ignorant persons," 
" starved by parsimony," " hovel," " farmer's apprentice," 
" excitement about new chimney." These conditions, 
mind you, were in Massachusetts, not in some border 
territory or frontier settlement, and the time was the 
third and fourth decades of the last century. 

But it must not be supposed that all were indiffer- 
ent to the existence of such deplorable conditions. 
The work of these men is fully discussed by Dr. Hins- 
dale in his " Life of Horace Mann,"* in the chapter on 
" Horace Mann's Forerunners." In this he aims " to 
name the principal of Mr. Mann's precursors, and briefly 
to characterize their work." The bibliography of the 
educational work is large and complete, and an investi- 
gator will find much that will interest him if he com- 
pares and contrasts the plans proposed. But in such a 
paper as this, which treats of the definite work of Charles 
Brooks, it would be wandering from the subject and 
would tend to confusion if an attempt were made to 
treat of the general work and of what others were doing, 
except as such work was related to that which Brooks 
marked out to be done by himself. Brooks did a defi- 
nite and specific work. Its inception, its progress, and 
its consummation, all are clearly defined. 

That Brooks did have a clear and definite purpose 

*Horace Mann and the Common School Revival in the United States, by B.A. Hinsdale, Ph.D. 
ll.d. Professor of the Science and the Art of Teaching in the University of Michigan. New 
York, Chas. Scribner's Sons, 1898. 



CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 15 

for which he was striving during these years is shown 
by the fact that he knew when his object was attained. 
Note his statement in the Framingham address, when 
he reviewed his great work. He briefly stated his pur- 
pose and its accomplishment in these words, " The Prus- 
sian system with its two central powers, a board of 
education and normal schools, was not known in New 
England, when I first described it in public in 1835, but 
on the 19th of April, 1838, Massachusetts, the Banner 
State, adopted State Normal Schools by statute. . . . 
The 19th of April, 1838, has ever since been a red letter 
day in my memory." 

Mr. Brooks' statement that the Prussian system was 
not known in New England is confirmed by the re- 
searches of Dr. Hinsdale, whose conclusion we can 
adopt. He found that "down to 1835, there is no direct 
evidence showing that American educators were ac- \f 
quainted with what had been done in Europe for the 
training of teachers."* 

There had been, however, from time to time, express- 
ions more or less formal, that teachers should be fitted 
for their work, for the reason that teaching is a profess- 
ion, and requires special training, as does any other 
profession. There was an appreciation of the fact that 
schools might be improved, and suggestions had been 
offered as to how to bring about the desired result. 
Not only in Massachusetts, but in Connecticut, New 
York, and Pennsylvania, were there those who were 
thinking, talking, and planning, but no practicable result 
had as yet been reached. 

In later years, after Massachusetts showed the way, 
and proved by results its effectiveness, other states fol- 
lowed. It has been pointed out by Dr. W. T. Harris, 
late United States Commissioner of Education, that 
while state pride usually leads to the choice of one's 
own state to head the list in educational history, uni- 
formly the second place is assigned to Massachusetts.! 

♦Hinsdale's Horace Mann, pp. 146-7. 

tMartin's Massachusetts Public School System, Editor's Preface. 



16 CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 

There is one name that stands out above all others in 
the early years of the educational revival, that is, prior 
to 1837, James G. Carter of Lancaster, Massachusetts. 
A Harvard graduate of 1820, a teacher by profession, a 
clear, strong thinker, and a forcible writer, he began as 
early as 1824 to publish to the world his thoughts on 
the Principles of Instruction. Then he sought to reach 
the public through the columns of a Boston newspaper, 
and suggested an outline of an institution for the educa- 
tion of teachers. His ideas were new, attracted much 
attention, and were discussed in the periodicals of the 
time. He was active in founding the American Institute 
of Instruction, in 1830, an organization that still exists 
in a flourishing condition, thus proving Carter's appre- 
ciation of what was needed. Later, as a member of the 
Legislature, he strove earnestly for the cause of educa- 
tion, as we shall see presently.'* 

But there was one thing lacking to set the work going, 
namely, the arousing of public sentiment to demand 
action that would lead to better teachers and better 
schools, and to this work, for which he was especially 
adapted, Charles Brooks gave three of the best years of 
his life. 

Now we left Mr. Brooks a while ago, sailing for Europe 
in 1833. Let us return to him and hear him tell in his 
own words how he was led to take up this work.f 

"At a literary soiree in London, August, 1834, I met Dr. H. 
Julius of Hamburg-, then on his way to the United States, having 
been sent by the King of Prussia to learn the condition of our 
schools, hospitals, prisons, and other public institutions. He asked 
to be my room-mate on board ship. I was too happy to accede to 
that request. A passage of forty-one days from Liverpool to New 
York gave me time to ask all manner of questions concerning the 
noble, philosophical and practical system of Prussian elementary 
education. He explained it like a sound scholar and a pious 
Christian. If you will allow the phrase, I fell in love with the 
Prussian system, and it seemed to possess me like a missionary 
angel. I gave myself to it, and in the Gulf Stream I resolved to 

*Barnards Journal of Education, Vol. V, pp. 407-416; also Hinsdale's Mann. p. 52; Martin's 
Public School System, p. 147. 
fFramingham Address. 



CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 17 

do something about State normal schools. This was its birth in 
me, and I baptized it my Seaborn School. 

" After this I looked upon each child as a being who could com- 
plain of me before God if I refused to provide for him a better 
education, after what I had learned." 

Six months later, that is, in the spring of 1835, Dr. 
Julius made a visit to Mr. Brooks at Hingham, and 
Brooks announced that he was going to make the at- 
tempt to introduce the Prussian system into Massachu- 
setts. 

It is evident that he recognized the importance of 
having a thorough preparation for the campaign, for in 
addition to his other studies, he corresponded with Victor 
Cousin, whom he had met upon his European journey. 
Cousin's work on the Prussian system of normal schools 
had already been translated into English, and was meet- 
ing with favor in the circles where the matter of im- 
proved educational facilities was the subject of deep 
concern. 

When Brooks felt that he had learned his story, he 
wrote and published, but in his own words, " Few read 
and still fewer felt any interest. I was considered a 
dreamer, who wished to fill our Republican Common- 
wealth with monarchical institutions." 

But Brooks' whole active life showed that he was not 
one to be turned aside from his purpose, if he had made 
up his mind that the idea for which he was working was 
right. If one plan did not bring the desired result, then 
others were devised. And, as by the printing press he 
did not obtain his results,* he determined to try the effect 
of his personal presence and his word of mouth. On 
Thanksgiving Day, 1835, he delivered a carefully pre- 
pared address to his people of Hingham, setting forth 
at length and in detail, the needs of the schools in gen- 
eral, and particularly, what the Prussian system of State 
normal schools, if adopted, would accomplish in Massa- 

*Christian Register, Dec. 27, 1834, "Schools." This article, unsigned, Brooks clipped and 
initialled in the scrap book. There are also unsigned articles, June 22 and July it, 1835, on Public 
Instruction of Prussia, which are in Brooks' style. 



18 CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 

chusetts. He dwelt on the phrase which he used so 
often, " As is the teacher, so is the school." 

He had hoped that there would be a request that this 
sermon be printed, but none came. Nevertheless, he 
found some encouragement, so that he was satisfied that 
by address and discussion he could best further the 
cause. Accordingly he prepared three lectures. He 
says himself they are enormously long, two hours each. 
The first described minutely the Prussian system. In 
the second, he showed how it could be adapted to con- 
ditions in Massachusetts, and how it would affect favor- 
ably each town, each school, each family, each child. 
The third lecture was to show the beneficent results of 
the State normal schools. 

By this time you are naturally and reasonably asking 
what was Prussian system and what did Mr. Brooks find 
to say in his three lectures of two hours each. He has 
preserved records of his having delivered them repeat- 
edly, separately and in series. The manuscripts them- 
selves have not been found, but by anticipating a little 
in the thread of the story, a document which Mr. Brooks 
drew up can be cited, as it contains in brief an exposi- 
tion of the Prussian system. This document was a pe- 
tition* sent to the Legislature in January, 1837, by the 
Halifax Convention. 

By the time of this convention, for which Mr. Brooks 
prepared the document, he had acquired a felicity and 
directness of expression by reason of his long experience 
in presenting the subject to many audiences. The doc- 
ument is a long one, and from it we can extract four 
crisp and expressive sentences which will give at least a 
working idea of the system. 

" The object of education is to develop all the powers, 
faculties, and affections of human nature in their natural 
order, proper time and due proportion, so that each one 
may occupy the exact place in the grown up character 
which God at first ordained in the infant constitution." 

♦Barnard's Journal of Education. Vol. XVII, p. 647. 




CHARLES BROOKS (1795-1872). 
Bust by Crawford, Rome, 1S42. 

Conforming to the wishes of the Brooks family, this bust was given to the Common- 
wealth of Massachusetts in 1892, and it has been placed appropriately in the office of the 
State Board of Education, Massachusetts State House. 



CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 19 

"He who has but half the powers (which God has be- 
stowed on him), developed and in action, is just half as 
useful and half as happy as he might have been." 

" The Prussian system, better than any with which 
we are acquainted, aims at unfolding the whole nature 
of man as the Creator designed ; thus bringing out all 
the talent of the country, and thereby giving to every 
child the chance of making the most of himself." 

" The Prussian system, therefore, is emphatically a 
Christian system. ' Love God, love man ; do to others 
as you would that others should do to you.' These are 
the basis of all their instructions." 

Now these citations have to do with the theory of 
education. But Brooks' work was practical rather than 
theoretical, and in the following quotation is the key to 
the method by which this Prussian system was to be 
put in practice. 

" The Prussian principle seems to be this : that everything which 
it is desirable to have in the national character should be carefully 
inculcated in elementary education. . . . Over and over again 
have the Prussians proved that elementary education cannot be 
fully attained without purposelv-prepai"ed teachers. They deem 
these seminaries of priceless value and declare them in all their 
reports and laws to be fountains of their success. Out of this fact 
in their history has arisen the maxim, ' As is the master, so is the 
school.' " 

You see, therefore, the outline of Mr. Brooks' plan. 

i st. Elementary education is not of local concern 
only, but is of national importance, and the State must 
so recognize it. 

2d. The State can best strengthen the cause of ele- 
mentary education by furnishing purposely-prepared 
teachers, for " as is the teacher, so is the school." 

3d. The State must commit the details to a Board 
of Education with a secretary who shall supervise and 
recommend. 

It may be anticipating a conclusion, but it is the fact, 
whether stated now or later, that this outline is exactly 



20 CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 

what the Commonwealth of Massachusetts adopted in its 
laws, and as we have become used to them, we find it 
difficult to conceive of the conditions, some of which 
have already been described. 

The system Brooks undertook to change was based 
first on the district, that is, that the education of the 
children was a matter to be cared for by the tax payers 
in that district. Hence, in advocating the principle that 
the education of the children was a concern of the State 
as well as of the locality, Brooks had to run counter to the 
feeling of local pride, for frequently a town would be 
subdivided into districts, each of which was independent 
of the others as regards its management of its schools. 

Brooks stated often that he originated nothing, but 
that he brought to his own people what he found abroad. 
But this is not a fair statement of what he did. A com- 
parison of what Dr. Julius told him on that voyage of 
forty-one days with the system as Brooks developed it, 
is indicative of how clearly and fully Brooks compre- 
hended the defects of the educational system prevailing 
here. 

Dr. Julius, during his tour of investigation in the 
United States, attended at Philadelphia a meeting of 
those interested in the welfare of prisoners. His remarks 
on education in its bearing on the prevention of crime 
were so well received that he was asked to allow them 
to be printed. It is fair to presume that he would not 
at that meeting state his facts any less strongly or clearly 
than he did to Brooks on that long voyage, so that we 
may regard these statements as being those on which 
Brooks based his enthusiasm for the Prussian system.* 

" The well-known — and since Mr. Cousin published his inter- 
esting report — far-famed Prussian system of national education 
went properly into practice in the year 1819, and has three funda- 
mental principles and supporting pillars. 

"First, the creation of seminaries or schools for teachers in the 

♦Remarks on the relation between Education and Crime in a letter to trie Rt. Rev. William 
White, d.d., president of the Philadelphia Society for Alleviating the Miseries of Public Prisons, 
by Francis Lieber, ll.d. To which are added some observations by N. H. Julius, m.d., of Ham- 
burg, a corresponding member of the society. Published by order of the society, Philadelphia, 1835. 



CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 21 

elementary schools, of which Prussia, with a population equal to 
that of the United States, has now forty-three, of the Protestant 
and Catholic denominations, furnishing annually from eight to nine 
hundred teachers, well informed and trained during three years for 
their future avocation. 

"Second, Legal obligation of parents and guardians to send 
children under their care, unless under qualified teachers at home 
or in authorized private schools, to the public schools from the first 
day of their seventh to the last day of their fourteenth years. 

"Third, The foundation of the whole system on a religious and 
moral basis, so that the first, or the first two hours of each day are 
directed entirely to a regular course of religious instruction, teach- 
ing, besides the reading of the Scriptures (for the Catholics, his- 
tories taken from the Bible), all the duties of man towards his 
Creator, the constituted authorities, and his fellow creatures, as 
they are inculcated by the Gospel." 

It must not be inferred that because Brooks seems to 
have laid little stress on the need of religious training 
in the public schools, he was indifferent to religious 
training for the young. When one remembers the tur- 
moil and confusion that history records as existing in 
the ecclesiastical circles of Massachusetts in 1836, when 
families were divided, friends and neighbors became 
enemies, business suffered, litigation was instituted in 
many instances, and strained relations were created, 
some of which continued almost to our time, it is signifi- 
cant that in the midst of the denominational strife, 
Brooks on Fast Day, 1836, could bring together in his 
church at Hingham an inter-denominational convention 
to consider Sunday-school work. He made the opening 
address, in which he dealt with the necessity of apply- 
ing recognized educational methods to Sunday-school 
teaching. The meeting must have been a long one, but 
that was a characteristic of the meetings of that time. 
The names of twelve of the speakers are given in the 
report in the Hingham paper, prepared by Mr. Brooks, 
and among them are found Unitarian and Trinitarian 
Congregationalists, Baptists, and Methodists. One sen- 
tence from the report must suffice: "It seemed deeply 
impressed on many minds that Sabbath-schools were to 



22 CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 

be the means of renovating the church, of reforming 
society, of saving the world."* 

By the autumn of 1836 Brooks had had enough ex- 
perience in the presentation of his subject to enable him 
to formulate a definite plan of campaign, and that this 
plan was successful the sequel shows. The changes of 
the last seventy years have already been spoken of. 
Here is another instance, for the method Brooks adopted 
successfully then would hardly attract attention now, 
even if it did not defeat the purpose entirely. His plan 
was to call a convention. 

First, he sent out a circular which he had carefully 
prepared and had printed as a broadside, containing 
sixteen hundred words. The date was November 10, 
1836, and the convention was not to meet until Decem- 
ber 7, nearly a month later. But communication was 
slow in those days. 

After a brief appeal by way of introduction, he said: — 

" In order that we may do something I would propose that a 
convention of delegates from the several towns in the county meet 
at Plymouth in Court Week (Wednesday, December 7, at 6 p.m.), 
to discuss the merits of the greatly improved modes of elementary 
instruction which have been in most successful operation for sev- 
eral years in Germany, Prussia, and other European states. This 
step might result in the appointment of a Board of Education. . . . 

" There is one provision preparatory to a full instruction of our 
youth, which I deem of vast moment; I mean, a seminary for pre- 
paring teachers. After this is established, all other improvements 
may be easily carried forward ; and until this is done, we shall, I 
fear, advance, but in very slow and broken steps. In Prussia there 
are forty-two such seminaries, and they are there found to be the 
very life blood of their school system, a system vastly superior to 
ours. Two such seminaries, one for males, and the other for fe- 
males, situated, the one in Plymouth and the other in Middleboro, 
would soon have a direct influence on every school in the county." 

He then mentions in detail topics that might be dis- 
cussed to advantage in meetings called officially by the 
Board of Education, such as schoolhouses and their con- 
struction, school books, compulsory attendance, and the 

*Hingham Gazette, April 15, 1836. 



CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 23 

prevention of truancy, the teaching of singing and draw- 
ing and other features which are today taken as matters 
of course, thanks to the adoption of the tried and proved 
Prussian system he advocated. 

But Brooks inspired others with his own enthusiasm, 
as this quotation shows : — 

" I sent copies of this circular, printed on letter paper, to each 
board of selectmen, each school committee, and each clergyman in 
the county, requesting clergymen to read it on the next Sunday to 
their people. Most of them read it. The circular was kindly 
noticed by the leading newspapers of the State. The large meet- 
ing-house of the First Parish in Plymouth was filled, and I opened 
the whole matter as clearly and strongly as I could, showing that 
the great work must begin by founding a State normal school in 
Plymouth County. 

"I invited the audience to catechize me as much as they could 
about my views and plans, and they did so. The audience warmed 
themselves up, and Ichabod Morton, Esq., Deacon of the First Par- 
ish, rose and said, 'Mr. President, I am glad to see this day. The 
work is well begun. The mass of facts now presented to us so 
plainly, prove conclusively the inestimable value of teachers' semi- 
naries. Mr. Brooks says he wants the first one established in the 
Old Colony, and so do I, sir, and I will give one thousand dollars 
towards its establishment.' 

" I knew that the generous offer of this humble and pious man* 
would do more for my cause than all my lectures, and I therefore 
secured a notice of it in every newspaper in Massachusetts. Thus 
my client, the Prussian stranger, began its journey from the Ply- 
mouth Rock."t 

The convention after two days' session, adopted reso- 
lutions endorsing Mr. Brooks' views. At all the con- 
ventions Mr. Brooks attended and where he spoke, it 

* Hon. Win. T. Davis of Plymouth has kindly furnished some facts about this enthusiastic co- 
adjutor of Brooks. Ichabod Morton, born in Plymouth, was a descendant of George Morton, the 
father of Nathaniel, the first secretary of the Plymouth Colony. His education was slight, for he 
became engaged early in the work of life; first, as clerk in, and then keeper of, a country store. 
As he had learned something of surveying, he would at times survey wood lots. His store keeping 
led to an interest in vessels, first in the Grand Bank fishing, and afterwards with larger vessels in 
the coasting and West India trade. Like all traders, in his early days he sold rum and other liquors, 
but at the institution of the temperance movement in Plymouth, he advertised September 8, 1827, 
on behalf of his firm " That prolific mother of miseries, that giant foe to human happiness, shall no 
longer have a dwelling under our roof." 

Feeling his own lack of early education, he was always advocating in town meeting increased 
appropriations for schools. He joined the anti-slavery movement in 1835, and when Brook Farm 
was established, he became a member and built a house there. His business interests at Plymouth 
naturally suffered by this, but he returned to them with more zeal than ever. He had six sons 
and a daughter, Mrs. Abby Morton Diaz, the author of the William Henry letters. 

f Address at Framingham. 



24 CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 

was his custom to have resolutions adopted, and these 
resolutions he prepared beforehand, so there was a unan- 
imity in the demands. This Plymouth convention was 
followed in quick succession during December by others 
at Hingham, Duxbury, New Bedford, Fairhaven and 
Bridgewater. Evidently there was then no Christmas 
rush. He must have been satisfied with the response 
at these meetings, for again he calls another convention ; 
this time it is for the specific purpose of securing for the 
Old Colony a seminary for teachers. The call was dated 
January 5, 1837, and was for a convention at Halifax on 
January 24, 1837. 

But after this call was issued and before the conven- 
tion was held, a couple of events happened which satisfied 
Mr. Brooks that his work had not been in vain. The 
first was the interrogative statement in the governor's 
message as to whether it would not be well to arrange 
for a school commission. The second event was an in- 
vitation from the Legislature that Mr. Brooks deliver an 
address before them on schools. Hear his own words 
on this: — 

"One evening in January, 1837, I was sitting reading to my 
family when a letter was brought me from the friends of education 
in the Massachusetts Legislature, asking me to lecture on my hobby 
subject. I was electrified with joy. The whole heavens, to my 
eyes, seemed now filled with rainbows. January 18 came, and 
the hall of the House of Representatives was perfectly full. I gave 
an account of the Prussian svstem, and they asked if I would lec- 
ture again. I consented, and the next evening endeavored to show 
how far the Prussian system could be safely adopted in the United 
States."* 

The Halifax convention voted to adopt a petition to 
the Legislature which Mr. Brooks drew up, and which 
the chairman and secretary signed, praying for a teachers' 
seminary in Plymouth County.! This petition sets forth 
at length the arguments Brooks used in his lectures, and 
it is worth a careful study. 

*(Jld Colony Memorial newspaper, October 4, 1S45. 
fHingham Gazette, February 24, 1837. 



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Rev. Chs. Brooks, 

My dear Sir, 

The new Normal School house at Bridgewater is to 
be dedicated on Wednesday the 19th inst., address by Hon. Wm. G. 
Bates. 

Your name is so familiarly associated with Normal Schools, that a 
Dedication would not be without danger of being set aside as spurious 
& invalid, if you were not present. Tho' we expect to have a pleasant 
time, yet we can hardly afford to go thro' with it again, & therefore 
we hope it will be legitimated by your presence. 

Very truly & sincerely, 
Yours 
Horace Mann. 
Wrentham Aug. 12, 1846. 



CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 25 

Two months later, in April, 1837, the act* establishing 
the Board of Education was signed by Governor Edward 
Everett, and now Horace Mann comes into the story of 
the movement, for he was appointed secretary for the 
board. This appointment was unexpected to him and 
to others, for Mr. Brooks and others who knew and 
appreciated what James G. Carter had been doing for 
fourteen years, advocated his appointment. It is thought 
that Edmund Dwight, of whom we shall hear more pres- 
ently, was responsible for Mann's appointment. There 
has never been any question that whoever it was that 
secured the appointment of Horace Mann to this impor- 
tant office, it was wise, discreet, and a tribute to some- 
one's knowledge of men, for later events showed that 
Mann was emphatically the one for the place. 

Until the date of Mann's appointment he had had 
nothing to do with the cause to which he gave so much, 
and on which his fame rests, except some experience as 
a tutor and one term as school committee man in Ded- 
ham. He was a lawyer in active practice. He had re- 
cently completed printing a revision of the statutes of 
Massachusetts and was serving a second term as presi- 
dent of the Senate when the act was passed establishing 
the Board of Education. What he did, what he endured, 
what attacks he had to meet, what financial sacrifices he 
made, all are matters of record, and his fame is secure. 

Brooks says that he thought that now it was time 
for him to return to his professional duties, as that for 
which he had labored had been accomplished when the 
board was created. But Mann urged him to keep on 
with his lecturing until normal schools were secured. 
Brooks replied that they were secured, now that the 
board had been established. Brooks, however, did con- 
tinue, for the movement had acquired such great momen- 
tum that he was needed to guide it by explaining just 
what was needed. 

*Acts of 1837, Chap. 241. An Act relating to Common Schools. The secretary shall diffuse 
information of educational methods " to the end that all children in this Commonwealth, who depend 
upon common schools for instruction, may have the best education which those schools can be made 
to impart." 



26 CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 

Up and down the state he went, two thousand miles 
in his chaise, and over into New Hampshire and Ver- 
mont, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York and Penn- 
sylvania, ever ringing the changes on his maxim : " As is 
the teacher, so is the school," stating the facts about what 
the system had actually wrought in Prussia, and urging 
the people to adopt the same successful system here. 

When the Legislature met in January, 1838, the next 
winter after the Board of Education had been established, 
the subject of normal schools was in the air and some- 
thing had to be done. The Legislature wished to hear 
arguments, and Horace Mann, as secretary, first addressed 
them. The second address was by Mr. Brooks on Nor- 
mal Schools and School Reform. The governor's mes- 
sage recommended normal schools, and when a private 
citizen anonymously, through Horace Mann as secretary, 
offered the Commonwealth of Massachusetts ten thou- 
sand dollars for normal schools if the Legislature would 
appropriate an equal amount, the act was passed. On 
April 19, 1838, the gift was accepted, the appropriation 
made, and normal schools began their course. The 
donor of the ten thousand dollars was Edmund Dwight,* 
a Boston merchant. 

In addition to his general lecturing, Brooks worked 
for a normal school in Plymouth County. In Septem- 
ber, 1838, a convention of the Plymouth County Asso- 
ciation for the improvement of schools was held at 
Hanover to urge the establishment of a normal school 
in Plymouth County. Mr. Brooks saw the importance 
of the meeting and of the thoughts brought out, for later 
he had an abstract of the speeches printed for circula- 
tion. To this meeting! Brooks succeeded in bringing 
as speakers, Horace Mann, Rev. Dr. George Putnam, 
Robert Rantoul, Jr., President John Quincy Adams and 
Daniel Webster. Mr. Adams had previously declined, 
giving as his reason his ignorance of the subject, but 

*Memoir of Edmund Dwight, by Francis Bowen. Barnard's Journal of Education, Vol. IV, 
t Barnard's Journal of Education. Vol. I, p. 587, has a full report of the meeting. 



CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 27 

Mr. Brooks wanted him and induced him to come. 
Adams, " the old man eloquent," was then deep in his 
contests over petitions to Congress. 

Mr. Adams' speech shows that he had learned much 
at the convention. Among other points he made was 
this: "We see monarchs expending vast sums in edu- 
cating the children of their poorest subjects, and shall 
we be outdone by kings ? " 

Daniel Webster, the old reporter said, " addressed the 
assembly for half an hour in his usual style of eloquence." 
One of his statements must be noted : " Teachers should 
teach things. It is a reproach that the public schools 
are not superior to the private. If I had as many sons 
as old Priam, I would send them all to the public schools." 

With such speakers and with the changes rung on 
the old theme of Plymouth Rock and the Old Colony, 
it is evident that any action a convention with such feat- 
ures might take, would carry weight. The demand was 
that a normal school be located in Plymouth County. 
One was eventually established at Bridgewater, but in- 
stead of being the first, it was the third. With this con- 
vention, Mr. Brooks' immediate labors ceased. 

About this time his name was suggested for the pro- 
fessorship of natural history in the University of the 
City of New York. His brilliant work in aid of the 
educational cause was well known, and that alone should 
have secured him the appointment, but in addition, he 
had the endorsement of four such men as Jared Sparks, 
Edward Everett, Josiah Quincy and John Quincy Adams. 
On receiving the appointment, he prepared to close his 
labors in Hingham, and the pastorate was terminated 
January i, 1839, after eighteen years of service. 

If this paper were to end with this incident, the point 
made some time ago would be emphasized ; namely, Mr. 
Brooks' work had a definite beginning and a definite 
ending. Possibly your interest, however, may be suffi- 
cient to cause you to ask as to his later life. On receiv- 
ing the appointment to this post, for which he had had 



28 CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 

no special training, he entered upon a preparation. As 
the best place for study of the subject was Paris, he went 
abroad September, 1839, and there remained four years. 
I have not learned whether on his return, in 1843, ne en ~ 
tered actively upon the duties of his position. If he did, 
it was for but a short time, for through failing eyesight, 
he was compelled to resign. One result of this foreign 
study was the compilation of a text-book entitled " Ele- 
ments of Ornithology," a copy of which he gave to the 
library at Harvard University. 

Two years later, that is, 1845, we find him on the 
Boston school committee, and, as usual, active in the 
work. In 1848, still carrying out his old desire to do 
something concerning a cause which aroused sympathy, 
he instituted the Society for the Relief of Aged and 
Destitute Clergymen, of which he, with Francis Park- 
man and Ephraim Peabody, were the incorporators, in 
1850. That society now has funds of nearly two hun- 
dred thousand dollars, and is aiding twenty beneficiaries 
in sums varying from one to five hundred dollars a 
year. The name has lately been changed from that 
given by Brooks, and is now the Society for Ministerial 
Relief. 

In 1853, he printed a small slip on colored paper, an- 
nouncing the preparation of a History of Medford, which 
was published two years later, in 1855. The press com- 
ments are preserved in the scrap book. At the same 
time, his attention was directed to what was probably a 
new subject of study, " The Evil Results following the 
Marriage of Near Blood Relatives. With his thorough- 
ness, he gathered many instances, and published and 
spoke. The scrap book contains an interesting account 
of an address by him in Providence, in 1855. The re- 
porter was a trifle facetious, and this facetiousness did 
not tend to lessen the attacks made on Brooks through 
the columns of a paper printed in one of the localities 
mentioned. Here is what the reporter made Mr. Brooks 
say : — 







CHARLES BROOKS (1795-1872). 

Photographed by Whipple, Boston, 1861. 



CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 29 

" Inhabitants of the Bahamas haven't much brains and are 
homely as sin. Reason, they intermarry. At Martha's Vineyard, 
they have a particularly bad time. The island is sea girt. The 
youths cannot go courting elsewhere because of the rolling billows, 
and so they content themselves with Marthas in the Vineyard. 
The island is in consequence, according to our author, full of illus- 
trations. Their minds," says Mr. Brooks, mildly, "are moderate. 
Their health is feeble." 

From this time on he was frequently called upon for 
addresses on education, and he apparently still retained 
his power to attract and charm his audiences. It was 
his custom, when addressing schools, to teach the chil- 
dren what he called his formula. Some of those who in 
childhood were taught it, have asked that it be preserved. 

" Children should be taught in school what they will most need 
in the world." So say the Prussians. Therefore learn 

1 . To live religiously. 

2. To think comprehensively. 

3. To reckon mathematically. 

4. To converse elegantly. 

5. To write grammatically. 

The last great work, or perhaps I had better say, the 
last of his special labors calling for his activity, was in 
the line of his work of thirty years previous. He worked 
very hard on behalf of a National Board of Education. 
By this time he was seventy years of age, but yet he 
wrote for the press, spoke in public, corresponded with 
members of Congress, and made journeys to Washington 
in advocacy of the cause. Letters have been found 
from Sumner, Banks, Boutwell, Garfield, Winthrop, and 
others, all of which show that he put his case in such a 
way as to receive attention. The measure as passed by 
Congress shows that a National Board of Education was 
established along the same lines that he urged the State 
of Massachusetts to adopt thirty years before ; namely, 
education is a matter of national concern. After this, 
he seems to have lived in retirement and an honored 
old age. He died at Medford, July 7, 1872, nearly 
seventy-seven years of age, leaving one son who died 
unmarried, in 1885. 



30 CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 

It is doubtful if again an attempt will be made to pre- 
pare a paper on the work of Charles Brooks for Normal 
Schools. It seems, therefore, that I should submit to 
you at this time what is the conclusion of my delving as 
an "educational antiquary," a personification of Mr. 
Brooks' fancy of sixty years ago. 

There are three men who will stand out above others 
in the history of that time : Carter, who showed the 
need ; Brooks, who offered the remedy and aroused 
public attention so that the law was established, and 
Horace Mann, who put the law into practice. 

At the Framingham meeting in July, 1864, one of the 
orators prepared an historical sketch of the labors of the 
men of the fourth decade of the century, and described 
what each had done. Of Brooks, he said : — 

" To Charles Brooks, whose labors in the years 1835-6-7 were 
second to those of no man — one might also say to no number of 
men — we owe the particular form which normal schools took, 
and he did very much toward preparing the public mind to look 
with favor on the new system. From his friend, Victor Cousin, 
the first scholar of France, he obtained reports and documents, and 
encouraging words which were to him the pabulum vitae ; for in 
this phase of the enterprise he stood almost, if not quite alone ; yet 
planting his feet literally on Plymouth Rock, he was conscious of 
strength.* 

Brooks waived for himself all claim to originating any 
policy. He found the Prussian system, urged its adop- 
tion, and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts made it 
a law. For over ten years, James Carter had been work- 
ing, but had made little progress. His field was among 
educators in the American Institute of Instruction, and 
later in the Legislature, where he did grand work. But 
the people had not been aroused, and in this particular 
and important field Brooks labored. 

To his audiences Brooks was a man of attractive 
presence, a cultured gentleman, thoroughly unselfish, 
plainly influenced by a desire to benefit children, rein- 
forcing his arguments with appeals to his hearers' patri- 

*Barnard's Journal of Education, Vol. XVII, p. 664. Historical Sketch by Rev. Eben S. Stearns. 



CHARLES BROOKS AND NORMAL SCHOOLS. 31 

otism and Christianity. Could there be any other effect 
than that the hearers should carry away pleasing remem- 
brances of the speaker and the cause ? 

To those who were brought into closer contact in the 
discussion, whether public or private, that was sure to 
follow his address, he showed himself a man of tact, 
energy, enthusiasm, and of unwavering faith that what 
had succeeded elsewhere would succeed here. And so 
he went, hither and yon, making friends for himself and 
friends for the cause, and the result was shown when the 
matter came before the Legislature ; and Carter, then a 
member, found his years of pleading strengthened with 
the support of legislators who were responsive to the 
wishes of their constituents, Brooks' friends. 

Mann took up the work where Brooks laid it down, 
and to him fell the application of the remedy Brooks 
had shown, and with this application went also the an- 
tagonism, yes, the contumely of those to whom the 
advance in education brought discomfort. Mann's work 
is recorded in detail in many places. Let there be also 
recorded the work of the man who brought the support 
of the public ; the high-minded, the self-sacrificing man 
of charming personality — Charles Brooks. 



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